[img]http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/arrow/images/8/8f/Kord_Industries_logo.png/revision/latest?cb=20130413071833[/img][hr]

[b]Chicago, IL
Kord Industries HQ,
Primary Laboratory[/b]

Yes, it was another bright day in the Windy City, the home of billionaire genius inventor Ted Kord, ever hard at work in his laboratory working on scientific marvels that the world has never seen at every moment!

[h3][color=skyblue]"OMNOMNOM!"[/color][/h3]

Or shamelessly using working in his lab as an excuse to indulge in junk food while he worked without being judged. But then, was it really his fault that Big Belly Burger was both addicting and a perfectly portable food for science-on-the-go? Plus he was hardly working on anything delicate, just making modifications to his B.B. Gun. Even if he did need some more important and sensitive work, he had plenty of help for that. Speaking of which-

[color=skyblue]"Hey Ted, could you hand me that laser cutter?"[/color]

A shimmering hologram manifested next to him in the form of his own grinning self and picked up the tool in question before walking back over and handing it to the inventor. His whole building was equipped with hard-light hologram projectors of his own design with an extremely humanlike AI that aided in everything from giving tours to home defense to helping with lab work. The fact that they were programmed with a fairly accurate summation of his own genius mind was just an added bonus.

[color=dodgerblue]"Sure thing Ted! and may I say you're looking particularly handsome today!"[/color]

[color=skyblue]"Right back at ya Ted-ster!"[/color]

A door at the back slid open and another Holo-Ted ran in, excitedly waving his arms.

[color=dodgerblue]"Hey Teds! Ted and Ted just got the new version of The Bug up and running! We're at 90% solar power!"[/color]

The real Ted Kord gave his holo-duplicates a thumbs up 

[color=skyblue]"Great work Teds! Give yourselves a pat on the back for our in-TED-ible work today!"

"BWAH-HAHAHAHA!~"[/color]
[color=dodgerblue]"BWAH-HAHAHAHA!~"
"BWAH-HAHAHAHA!~"[/color]

Ah, sometimes he made himself laugh. But the joking around and junk food and casual super-science was interrupted by something serious and unprecedented. It was an alert from the vault where Ted stored some of his most valuable and dangerous projects and items, specifically from its' deepest and most well-guarded layer. It was the place where he kept the artifact entrusted to him by his old mentor Dan Garrett: The Scarab. Dan had thought the Scarab was an item of mystical power, but over years of analysis Ted had long ago determined it was actually some sort of alien super-technology, centuries ahead of even some of the other alien gadgets and gizmos he'd studied in the past. Dan had activated The Scarab with magic, but he'd always said it had a bond with him, a bond Ted had been unable to get it to answer to, causing him to conclude that the use of magic had damaged it somehow. As a result, he had used the Scarab as an object of study but otherwise locked it away for safekeeping.

For years, ever since the death of Dan Garrett, the Scarab had lain dormant and Ted had gone about his work and become Blue Beetle on his own merits.

But now...now the Scarab was awake.

And it was sending out a signal.